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Thread: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

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    Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Looking for some cat6 cable to networking at home, and found these two options:

    £6.99 for 10m - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...&s=electronics
    £2.79 for 12m - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/RJ45-Cat6e...e0f5f#shpCntId

    Is the cheaper cable from ebay likely to-good-to-be-true?

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Old adage "If something seems too good to be true, it probably is". On the other hand, buying more expensively doesn't necessarily mean better quality/performance (look at audio and HDMI cable prices)

    Can you verify the specification before you buy? Do you have any comeback if it doesn't work as expected? Is the seller a known and reputable retailer, based in the UK?

    If the answers to the above are no, do you mind taking a gamble?

    You could buy a short length and pull it apart to see what the cable quality is like. The fact it has moulded plugs could be good, on the other hand, it would be used to disguise any old bit of cable.

    High performance twisted pair cable is made to quite tight tolerances, the twist pitch may be different for different pairs for example, and the way he different pairs are laid is quite important.

    He is only selling lengths up to 50 metres, which is below the theoretical maximum for Cat 6. Is that because the cable doesn't work reliable above that length?

    I don't know, but it might be cheap enough to take a punt, you could be lucky.
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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    I would be a little suspicious of incredibly cheap cables, but it depends what you're using as a yardstick. Scan generally aren't too expensive for network cables, and Kenable is usually pretty good as well. I would compare your eBay prices to those, rather than Amazon, and see what the difference is like.

    My concern would be that it would be very easy to label a cat5, or for that matter, non-cat5 compliant, cable and label it as cat6, because very few consumers are likely to know the difference and check. For the odd one who complains, the seller could claim it was an accident and exchange it without any negative feedback hitting their account. So I would have a look around - if it's significantly cheaper than all the competition then I would absolutely be suspicious.

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    The one from eBay sounds a bit suspicious as wile Cat5e is a TIA designation Cat6e is NOT, the enhanced version of Cat6 is Cat6a.
    Looking a bit closer at the eBay one it says in the description Copper Clad Aluminium conductor, where Cat6 should be made of copper.

    If you are only going 10m, and its Gigabit Ethernet, Cat5e will be OK, only if its 10Gigabit then you need Cat6 for 10M run.

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Thanks, guys, I'll stay clear of the ebay cable. I have confidence in the Amazon cable... at least I'm happy to take a punt. I know I don't need cat6 for a 10-15 m run, but the difference in price nowadays means I may aswell get cat 6 over cat5e while I'm getting under the floor boards now.

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Just looked on kenable website... cheaper than Amazon. I'll take the recommendation (thanks, Jim).

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    I've got both. The eBay one I picked up as a spare when it popped up on HUKD. Quite simply, it's awful. It split in no time leaving the twisted pair exposed. Then the connector split. Rubbish.
    The Duronic ones aren't too bad. Certainly okay for home use. Build quality is fine.

    Check your local poundland. Mine has loads of Belkin Cat5 and Cat6 cables that are very good quality for a quid. I picked up a few when I was in there last, but decided not to get any more as I don't need them at the moment.
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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Kenable has a good selection. Amazon isn't so bad for quality if you find the right product, but it can be more expensive. I recently bought 20m of copper CAT6 from Amazon with no complaints.

    Comparing Amazon's 20m copper CAT6 [can't post links yet , search for ASIN B003SXIE5Y] for (£10) with Kenable's 20m copper CAT6 (£10.22 + 99p postage), Kenable is slightly more expensive. But the more you buy from Kenable the cheaper it is.

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Can I ask why you want cat6 in the first place? The cat? specification relates to the performance end to end of the whole network, so there is no point connecting two devices together with a cable of higher specification than the two endpoints.

    A PC with a network card with a cat5e gigabit card will not connect any faster or give higher throughput with a cat6 or cat7 cable, so it is pointless buying one.

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Probably the same as why I just laid CAT6, the cost difference between wasnt that big (around 25p/meter for CAT5 vs 36p/meter for CAT6), though I do have a 10GbE switch between my PC and my homeserver and 10GbE NICs in each

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Put it this way, if a company can go wrong with cables then they truly are bad

    It's just a copper cable at the end of the day; where quality distinguishes is through physical means, whether that's shoddy materials or manufacturing (a.k.a how its kinked/bent and it's physical dimensions and how it's terminated).

    Whether it's up to the "standard" and has been tested or not who knows. But honestly don't trust the listing name, "professional" and "gold" doesn't = quality, that's just a marketing trick.
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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?


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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Cat6 has better shielding than Cat5. This shielding also makes the cable inflexible and is more succeptable to damge due to bending. Think about whether you really need the extra shielding. If you are running it along walls and plan on 90 degree turns forget about cat6 and go for a decent cat5 cable.

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Shielded cable is only of any use if you have a network which is shielded throughout. Jacks, cables, patch panels, switches and so on...all need to be part of this process.

    Just using a shielded cable without these considerations won't do anything, as the shielded part is subject to the same EMI / Voltage changes as the main twisted pair.
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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Does cable length effect speed/ping much? ie 1m vs 10m for a 60-70mb connection

    I've just moved house, thinking of getting matching cables everywhere (the yellow/grey/white/black combo isn't working for me, and they are excessively long)

    My ping is about 35ms and would like to get that down if I can.

    I was thinking of going Cat6 (just because why not) but this thread makes me think otherwise.

    If its entirely pointless feel free to point it out

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    Re: Cat6... should I be suspicious of cheap cost?

    Given that you can get pings of around 100ms across the length of the UK, I'm going to gamble that a 10m cable won't make much difference.

    Cat6 is futureproofing really, IMO. For current 1Gb networks (let alone 100Mbps) it's not going to give you any benefit over Cat5e, and it's more expensive and less flexible.

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